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Science’s Breakthrough of the Year: Uncovering “Ardi”

The research that brought to light the fossils of Ardipithecus ramidus, a hominid species that lived 4.4 million years ago in what is now Ethiopia, has topped Science’s list of this year’s most significant scientific breakthroughs. The monumental find predates “Lucy”—previously the most ancient partial skeleton of a hominid on record—by more than 1 million years, and it inches researchers ever-closer to the last common ancestor shared by humans and chimpanzees.

Want to learn more about 2009’s top scientific advances? Read the Breakthrough of the Year articles and a related editorial by Science Editor-in-Chief Bruce Alberts, and view related multimedia resources.

Science and its publisher, AAAS, the nonprofit science society, recognize the Ardipithecus ramidus fossils, including the partial skeleton named “Ardi,” as 2009’s Breakthrough of the Year. They also identify nine other important scientific accomplishments from this past year in a top ten list, appearing in a special news feature in the journal’s 18 December 2009 issue.

The Ardipithecus research “changes the way we think about early human evolution, and it represents the culmination of 15 years of painstaking, highly collaborative research by 47 scientists of diverse expertise from nine nations, who carefully analyzed 150,000 specimens of fossilized animals and plants,” said Bruce Alberts, editor-in-chief of Science, in a related editorial.

An international team of scientists offered the first comprehensive, peer-reviewed description of Ardipithecus in a special issue of Science published on 2 October 2009. Until then, the fossil record contained only scant evidence of other hominids older than “Lucy.”

Watch Tim White talk about his research with AAAS's Kathy Wren

After analyzing the skull, teeth, pelvis, hands, feet, and other bones, they determined that Ardipithecus possessed a mix of “primitive” traits, shared with its predecessors—the apes of the Miocene epoch—and “derived” traits, which it shared exclusively with later hominids.

However, many of its traits do not appear in modern-day African apes. One surprising conclusion, therefore, is that it is likely that the African apes have evolved extensively since we shared that last common ancestor, which thus makes living chimpanzees and gorillas poor models for the last common ancestor and for understanding our own evolution since that time.

The first Ardipithecus fossils were actually dug up in 1994, but the team of researchers responsible for their discovery was careful not to rush the findings to the public. Instead, more than a decade of detailed analysis and documentation followed, as the experts sent their fossils to various laboratories around the world for evaluation. This collaborative, international effort to study “Ardi” and her environment represents a major scientific landmark of both discovery and analysis.

Progeny of HSCs that were engineered to carry the correct version of a gene (through the integration of a lentiviral vector) distribute throughout the body. Cartier et al. show that some cells replaced diseased microglia in the brain and relieved lipid storage in patients suffering from ALD. This image relates to an article that appeared in the 6 November 2009 issue of Science, published by AAAS. The study, by Dr. Nathalie Cartier-Lacave of INSERM in Paris, France and colleagues, was titled, "Hematopoietic Stem Cell Gene Therapy with a Lentiviral Vector in X-Linked Adrenoleukodystrophy."
[Image courtesy of Y. Greenman/Science]

Science’s list of the nine other groundbreaking achievements from 2009:

Rapamycin: Researchers found that tinkering with a key signaling pathway produces life-extending benefits in mice—the first such result ever achieved in mammals. The discovery was particularly remarkable because the treatment did not start until the mice were middle-aged.

Graphene: In a string of rapid-fire advances, materials scientists probed the properties of graphene—highly conductive sheets of carbon atoms—and started fashioning the material into experimental electronic devices.

Plant ABA Receptors: Solving the structure of a critical molecule that helps plants survive during droughts may help scientists design new ways to protect crops against prolonged dry periods, potentially improving crop yields worldwide and aiding biofuel production on marginal lands.

Hubble Space Telescope of NGC 4710
[Image courtesy of NASA, ESA, and P. Goudfrooij of Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI)]
LCLS at SLAC: SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory unveiled the world's first x-ray laser, a powerful research tool capable of taking snapshots of chemical reactions in progress, altering the electronic structures of materials, and myriad other experiments spanning a wide range of scientific fields.

Gene Therapy Comeback: European and U.S. researchers made progress in treating a fatal brain disease, inherited blindness, and a severe immune disorder by developing new strategies involving gene therapy.

Monopoles: In an experimental coup, physicists working with strange crystalline materials called spin ices created magnetic ripples that model the predicted behavior of “magnetic monopoles,” or fundamental particles with only one magnetic pole.

LCROSS Finds Water on the Moon: In October, sensors aboard a NASA spacecraft detected water vapor and ice in the debris from a spent rocket stage that researchers deliberately crashed near the south pole of the Moon.

Hubble Repair: In May, a nearly flawless final repair mission by space-shuttle astronauts gave the Hubble Space Telescope sharper vision and a new lease on life, resulting in its most spectacular images yet.

The special news feature will also revisit last year’s Breakdown of the Year—the financial meltdown—and explore the effects of this year’s Virus of the Year—H1N1 flu—on scientific research and collaborations.